title: Quantifying the buildup in extent and complexity of free exploration in mice.
abstract: To obtain a perspective on an animal's own functional world, we study its behavior in situations that allow the animal to regulate the growth rate of its behavior and provide us with the opportunity to quantify its moment-by-moment developmental dynamics. Thus, we are able to show that mouse exploratory behavior consists of sequences of repeated motion: iterative processes that increase in extent and complexity, whose presumed function is a systematic active management of input acquired during the exploration of a novel environment. We use this study to demonstrate our approach to quantifying behavior: targeting aspects of behavior that are shown to be actively managed by the animal, and using measures that are discriminative across strains and treatments and replicable across laboratories.
authors.affiliation: Department of Statistics and Operations Research, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv 69978, Israel.
authors.forename: Yoav
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Benjamini
authors.forename: Ehud
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Fonio
authors.forename: Tal
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Galili
authors.forename: Gregor Z
authors.initials: GZ
authors.lastname: Havkin
authors.forename: Ilan
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Golani
mesh_terms: D000818:Animals; D005106:Exploratory Behavior / Q000502:physiology*; D051379:Mice; D008807:Mice, Inbred BALB C; D008810:Mice, Inbred C57BL; D009068:Movement / Q000502:physiology; D013997:Time Factors